Formal moves to close Woodfield Community Primary School in Bilton will begin next week.
North Yorkshire County Council revealed plans in October to ‘technically close’ the school and merge it with Grove Road Community Primary School.
Now, after a two-month consultation, the wheels are to be set in motion.
A report by Stuart Carlton, corporate director for children and young people’s services at the council, recommends councillors vote to approve the closure on Tuesday next week.
If they agree, the council will issue statutory notices on March 3 proposing to amalgamate the schools from August 31 this year.
Mr Carlton’s report says:
“While it is acknowledged that the proposed closure of Woodfield Community Primary School will cause uncertainty and disruption for pupils, parents and staff, Grove Road School would work closely with parents, as both schools do now, to meet the needs of individual children.”
Read more:
- Parents vow to fight closure of ‘fantastic’ Woodfield primary school
- County council ‘would give Woodfield school more time to improve if it could’
- Woodfield primary school set to close in September
Woodfield has been unable to find an academy willing to take it on since it was rated inadequate by Ofsted in January 2020.
The council says it therefore has little option but to close it.
Walking bus between sites
Two online public meetings were held on January 10 and 17 as part of the closure consultation.
According to council notes of the meetings, concerns were raised at the meetings about problems for parents picking up and dropping off children at both sites, leadership arrangements, provision for children with special educational needs and use of the Woodfield site.
Parents rallied to oppose the closure when it was announced.
If the plans go ahead, all nursery children would be based at the current Woodfield site from September and all other children would be at Grove Road. From September 2023, reception children would join nursery children at Woodfield and eventually all early years and key stage one children would be located at Woodfield.
There are plans to organise a ‘walking bus’ between the two schools, which would see pupils move between the two sites accompanied by staff via the Nidderdale Greenway cycle route, the iron bridge and a school crossing patrol on Skipton Road.
One parent said during the consultation that children would be:
“Absolutely freezing and there is going to have to be half an hour at either end of the day to allow for walking. It doesn’t seem feasible.”
Another parent raised safety concerns.
There are plans to re-open a rear entrance to the Woodfield site to shorten the journey.
Pupil numbers fall to 41
Documents to councillors reveal that pupil numbers at Woodfield have slumped from 49 to 41 since the closure proposal was announced.
Some parents told the consultation that the closure was already a done deal, with one saying “the children will have to suffer for it”.
But another response said it provided “unprecedented” opportunities, adding:
“I believe the benefits to our current pupils and prospective ones will be enormous.”
